Transport police launch bursary for ‘British African students’
British Transport Police is to launch a bursary for “British African” law students after admitting “systemic racism” in the force was behind a major miscarriage of justice.
Chief Constable Lucy D’Orsi said the force “cannot undo the past but we can learn from it” as she pledged to combat racism including Afriphobia, defined as prejudice against Africans and people of African descent.
However, the decision prompted backlash from back-to-basics campaigners, who criticised the force for uncritically adopting contested language and divisive political ideology.
The move follows the posthumous quashing of the convictions of two men who were framed by a racist and corrupt British Transport Police (BTP) detective.
Saliah Mehmet and Basil Peterkin, who died in 2021 and 1991 respectively, are the 10th and 11th people to have convictions relating to the BTP officer Det Sgt Derek Ridgewell quashed, who died in prison in 1982.
Ridgewell, who also framed the Oval Four and Stockwell Six, was jailed for seven years in 1980 for stealing mail bags worth £364,000 from the Bricklayers Arms goods depot in Southwark, south London.
This was the offence for which Ridgewell framed Mehmet and Peterkin.
Ms D’Orsi said the trauma caused by Ridgewell was “inexcusable” and happened during times when “systemic racism played a role in the culture of the force, as it did across many parts of society”.
Sombre point of reflection’
“This is an important and sombre point of reflection in our history. BTP is committed to combating racism, which includes Afriphobia, which led to these historic cases that targeted African youths and destroyed lives,” she said.
“Since I last commented on this we have agreed to fund a bursary for a British African youth to study law. The bursary will be funded by the Proceeds of Crime Act, and aims to ensure that British African communities are better represented within the UK judicial system, which will benefit us all.
“My colleagues and I are profoundly sorry to all those affected by Det Sgt Ridgewell’s atrocious actions and the trauma that victims and their families suffered as a result.
“I would like to reiterate my sincere apology for the trauma caused to the British African community by a corrupt BTP officer, whose misuse of his powers caused harm not only to the innocent young people criminalised, but also to their families and community.”
Former police officer Rory Geoghegan, who used to be a Nuo 10 policy adviser on crime and founder of the Public Safety Foundation, criticised the idea of a bursary exclusively for British Africans, saying it was “concerning” that the force should believe the answer to “past discrimination is more discrimination today”.
He deemed use of the term “Afriphobia”, which has a very limited use in the UK, as “another sign of policing uncritically adopting contested language and ideology”.
“If police chiefs are to retain the confidence of the majority of British people, they must wake up to the divisive political activism and ideology that some of them appear captured by,” he added.
Speaking outside the Royal Courts of Justice in London, the families of Mehmet and Peterkin lamented the time taken to obtain justice and demanded a new law enshrining the need to review all cases of a police officer who is imprisoned.
Regu Saliah, the eldest son of Mehmet, said: “He lived as a victim of Det Sgt Ridgewell, the corrupt and racist police officer, for over 43 years.
“What he was put through those years left a traumatic legacy that stayed with him his whole life, unfortunately.”
